Smart Government in United Arab Emirates: Examining Organizational Readiness Abdulfattah Yaghi & Badriya Al Jinaibi United Arab Emirates University SECoPA Conference 2015, Charleston, SC, USA September 30- October 4, 2015 This paper has been funded by a generous research grant from United Arab Emirates University, Center for Public Policy and Leadership #31R003-Research Center-CPPL-2-2013.

Introduction “Smart Government (SG)”initiative was a tool to enable governmental agencies to provide services efficiently through simple and transparent procedures around-the-clock and to meet people's expectations (Dubai Smart Government, 2013b). “UAE Vision 2021” and “Abu Dhabi Vision 2030” stress the government’s priority to improve public services and to use technology in providing important services from A to Z. This is an ongoing project funded by the Center for Public Policy and Leadership at UAE University. The project is divided into two phases: The first phase took place two years before SG has become mandatory (2013) and before agencies have utilized it in all services delivered to people. In this phase, the study aimed at surveying employees in the public sector to understand their perception of SG and how they felt about providing smart public services. The second phase takes place after SG has become a mandatory policy in all public agencies. The study assessed employees’ opinion about the smart services they provided and how satisfied they were with that.

Short Background Information The early implementation of SG was in Dubai in 2000 by establishing a small governmental entity (department) to coordinate and supervise cooperation among agencies to ensure proper achievement of good governance. In June 2013, the department has become large and therefore the name was changed from “E- Government Department” to “Dubai Smart Government”, in line with the UAE vision 2021. Today, all public agencies are mandated to provide at least 80% of their services via smart means, especially through smart phones and iPad applications.

Source: UN Public Administration Program (2012) Country E-Government 2012 Rank 2012 Rank 2010 Rank Change    Austria 0.7840 21 24 +3    Iceland 0.7835 22    Spain 0.7770 23 9 -14    Belgium 0.7718 16 -8    Russian Federation 0.7345 27 59 +32 United Arab Emirates 0.7344 28 49 +21    Lithuania 0.7333 29 -1    Croatia 0.7328 30 35 +5

Purpose & Methods The purpose of the presentation is to briefly summarize the data collected from employees (1400) about how they felt about their agencies’ preparations and preparedness to adopt SG in federal and local agencies. Univariate analysis was utilized in SPSS. The presentation does not provide summary of the structured interviews with department heads. Research Questions: Q1: What are the main sources of initiatives to implement Smart Government in employees’ respective agencies? Q2: What are the levels of employees’ satisfaction with the progress their agencies have achieved in implementing Smart Government? Q3: What are the major challenges that so far face the proper implementation of Smart Government initiatives?

Sources or Smart Government Initiatives Source of initiative % Governmental ministries 28.7 Local governments 53.2 Private sector 18.1 Technological innovative initiatives from inside or outside the country 24.5 Other sources 6.4

Satisfaction with the Progress Level of Smart Government Application Comparative Standard Satisfactory % Unsatisfactory % Progress of smart government compared to international standards 73.3 26.7 Progress of smart government compared to UAE standards 92.1 7.9 Progress of smart government in ministries 78.7 21.3 Progress of smart government in local government entities 85.1 14.9

Challenges that Face Further Successes of Smart Government Application Serious Challenge % Not a Serious Challenge % Clients’ literacy in information technology 91.4 28.6 Budget allocated for smart government adoption 82.1 17.9 Government’s need to take measures to protect clients’ privacy 80.5 19.5 Clients’ reluctance to give personal information when using smart services 77.6 22.4 Making smart services easy to use by clients 77.3 22.1 Clients’ lack of interest in using smart services and applications 71.6 28.4 Cost of making smart applications available (accessible) to clients 70.9 29.1 Cost of preparing legal infrastructure for smart application (e.g., legislations) 69.2 30.8 Extent of difficulty of using smart applications 69.1 30.7 Employees’ literacy in information technology 68.8 31.2 Cost of developing smart applications 62.3 37.7 Large diversity of languages spoken by clients in UAE 62 38.0 Employees’ adequate access to the Internet 55.7 44.3  

General Perceptions of Smart Government Statement Agreement % Disagreement % UAE has sufficient laws and regulations to regulate smart government 51.3 48.7 I am satisfied with the way smart government is being carried out in my organization 41.3 38.7 Checking client’s personal identification can be a legal constraint 57.3 42.7 UAE already has adopted an electronic signature system 60.3 39.7 Electronic signature is essential to the success of smart government 73.2 26.8 UAE has sufficient regulations to protect clients using smart services 68 32.0 UAE in-place laws are sufficient to protect clients’ against electronic crimes 75 25.0 I think adopting smart government has led to an increase in clients’ demand on smart services 69.9 30.1 I am confident that smart government applications are easy to use 68.7 31.3 Speed of the Internet in UAE is adequate to sustain smart government 63.2 36.8 I think that most people in UAE can easily use the Internet 52 48.0

Conclusion Employees believe that UAE public agencies are generally and relatively prepared to implement smart government and its advanced editions. However, the analysis showed that employees believe that the public (clients) needs to be trained on using smart services. Employees also indicated that agencies did not allocate sufficient budgets to implement smart government and the transition to it. The privacy concerns came up as a serious challenge to effective implementation of SG. It was clear that employees were concerned about the cost of SG, a fact that might contradict the popular belief that SG is cheaper than traditional service delivery methods. Thank You